- Blower, LSD, muffler delete,
heel-toe, blinker fluid.
You've heard these terms a million times before,
but what do they all mean?
Today, we're gonna look at some car terms
that every car nerd needs to know.
Easy noob stuff to expert level shop talk.
How many do you know? Let's find out.
Hey, big thank you to our friends at Keeps
for sponsoring yet another episode of Wheelhouse.
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Now, let's Keep this episode going.
Be a gearhead is a lifetime pursuit.
No matter how many wrenches you turn,
how much gas you breathe,
how many engine blocks do you accidentally crack,
there's always something to learn.
Sometimes it's intimidating to talk to car folk,
because you literally don't know what they're talking about.
So we've made it easy on you and compiled a list.
Let's start with an easy one.
A muffler is like a big box in your exhaust system
that muffles noise and keeps every car on the road
from sounding like a Harley Davidson.
Like I said, we're gonna start easy.
This list is going to ramp up.
A resonator is a device that comes just before the muffler.
It acts as a sort of echo chamber to focus the sound,
so the muffler can silence it.
It's usually the fat section of an exhaust pipe
looking like that big, weird section on a worm.
You know what I'm talking about, right?
What's up with that part of the worm, what is that?
Downpipe in older cars refers to a pipe
that carries exhaust from the exhaust manifold
to the rest of the exhaust system.
In a turboed engine, however, it carries exhaust
from the turbine to the rest of the exhaust.
Moving on to the chassis.
A unibody is when the car's chassis
is a single piece of metal that also joins with bodywork,
born perfect and beautiful.
This is in contrast to a ladder frame,
which is employed by most trucks and off-road vehicles.
A ladder frame uses frame rails as the body sits on top.
And then you've got some cross members
and it makes the whole ladder frame look like a ladder.
When it comes to fuel delivery,
cars either have carburetors,
or more commonly nowadays, fuel injection.
I don't think a car has been with a carburetor
since like the mid '80s.
In a carbureted engine, the gas and air mixture
comes together before it moves through the intake manifold
into the cylinders.
And direct fuel injection
shoots the fuel straight into the cylinder.
CEL is the check engine light on your dash.
Just the side of this light
can strike fear into the hearts of the bravest of tuners.
Sometimes it looks like this,
which can be confusing even to major car nuts.
We prefer this one. It's just way more clear.
FWD, or front wheel drive,
the front wheels drive the car, obviously,
RWD is rear wheel drive,
and 4WD, it's four wheel drive,
which means your car is capable of providing power
to all four wheels when they need it
either automatically or manually controled.
Basically, 4WD can operate as either two
or four wheel drive.
AWD or all wheel drive means the engine supplies power
to all the wheels at all the same time.
Torque is the measurement of twisting force
measured in pounds feet.
If you hold a 12 inch ruler in one hand
and put a one pound weight at the end of it,
you're twisting with one pound foot of torque.
A lot of hype is given to horsepower,
which is how quickly it can do work.
But torque is also extremely important and really tells you
how quickly you can get out of the hole
or get out of a turn or accelerate, you know?
All right, so now we're gonna get
into some more general engine terms
that have to do with engine layout.
You've heard of I4, I6, V6, straight six, slant six.
When someone refers to a car as a V8 or inline six,
what does that mean?
Well, they're referring to the number and arrangements
of cylinders in the engine.
This is a straight six,
because the cylinders are all lined up in a row,
straight up and down.
This is a V6 because the cylinders
are arranged in a V shape.
This is a Chrysler slant six,
where all the cylinders are slanted 30 degrees.
I'm a six because only 40% of dudes are hotter than me,
F-F and F-R describe front or rear engine position
and front or rear wheel drive.
For example, F-R is front engine, rear wheel drive.
R-R is rear engine rear wheel drive,
as well as the sound, a seal makes.
(seal honks)
And FFA is front engine, all wheel drive.
Bondo is a body putty.
You can use it to fill tiny holes and cracks.
You can sand it down. You can paint over it.
You can do a bad job with it
and make your car look like (beep),
and then just say, screw it and buy a new body panel.
Whatever you do though,
don't use it for structural integrity.
W-O-T, WOT or wide open throttle.
It's when you've got the pedal all the way to the floor,
throttle opens up all the way.
You don't have time to say the whole term.
So you've just got to abbreviate it.
WOT. WOT.
When you hear someone say N/A,
they're saying naturally aspirated.
This refers to any engine that doesn't force air
into the cylinders with a turbo or supercharger.
Speaking of naturally aspirated,
one of my favorite engine terms is HEMI,
and it's not just a name for Chrysler V8.
Hemi refers to the shape
of the hemispherical combustion chamber in the engine.
Before the Chrysler Hemi's debut in the early '50s,
most car manufacturers used flathead designs,
which got the job done, but weren't very efficient.
Hemispherical heads, on the other hand,
allowed for the use of much larger valves,
which increased airflow through the engine,
which always increases power.
There's a lot more to the Hemi
than I can get into right now,
so to learn more about it,
check out are up to speed on the Hemi.
It's one of my favorite episodes. I just love them Hemis.
Turbochargers and superchargers kind of do the same thing.
They're both essentially pumps
that compress additional air fuel mix
into the cylinder before combustion.
Turbochargers are powered
by the energy from the exhaust gas,
while superchargers are driven by a belt
connected to the crankshaft.
Spinney boi is slang for a turbocharger.
There are also a million other slang terms for these things,
we got whooshie boys, snails, turbine.
You can probably just make up your own, honestly.
And if you say it with enough confidence,
people will believe you.
Here at Donut we call them spinny boys.
Blow off valve.
Even if you don't know this term,
you've definitely heard the sound of things.
Sometimes they're called BOVs or BPVS for bypass valve.
These take the load off the turbo,
when the throttle is suddenly closed.
Without a blow off valve,
there just be a lot of pressure in between the turbo
and closed throttle.
So the blow off valve lets off that pressure.
(car rumbles)
Now, when it comes to superchargers,
there are three different types of them.
I like to refer to them as blowers.
Roots is the heaviest and biggest style of supercharger.
It looks the coolest, but it's the least efficient kind.
It has nothing to do with the Sepultura album,
it's just named after the guy who invented it.
Twin screw superchargers use two screws
to squeeze the air into the engine.
They usually sit on top of the engine and are very loud.
Do not Google twin screw in front of your twin.
Central fugal superchargers are the most efficient
of the blower boys.
They use a spinning compressor to squeeze the air,
and as a result, they kind of look like turbos.
They can be mounted on the front of your engine,
which is kind of a bummer,
because then you don't get to cut a hole in your hood.
You might've heard of X-pipe and H-pipe exhaust setups.
While these two will make your V engine car sound different,
the main benefit these pipes bring to the table
is a balancing effect between your two cylinder banks.
Exhaust pressure can build up on one side of your engine
and an X- or H-pipe can allow the pressure even out
and flow better through the exhaust system.
They also sound really dope, especially X-pipes.
(car rumbles)
A cat is your catalytic converter.
It's another exhaust device
that reduces the amount of toxins in the exhaust gas.
This is one thing you don't want to delete.
They get stolen all the time.
And if you steal catalytic converters,
please just get a job instead.
A lot of people actually do cut these out of their system
because they think they reduce power.
That kind of used to be true,
when cats first came on the scene,
but nowadays they're very efficient
and don't offer much benefit if you take them out.
So don't do that.
Plus you can't pass them off.
A delete is when you just remove a feature of your car.
You hear people say that they have a muffler delete
or a cat delete.
And all that means
is they're probably not gonna pass (indistinct) next year.
A sleeper is a car that looks unassuming on the outside,
but it's built like a racer on the inside.
The trick is lull opposing racers
into a false sense of security,
not realizing what's under the hood.
Our boys Tony Angelo and Lucky over at Hot Rod Garage
probably built the coolest sleeper of all time,
the Maliby, I got to drive it around the block one time.
And it was the sickest thing ever.
I love sleepers. I love a good sleeper.
Let's talk about some suspension stuff.
A solid axle or a live axle
is when an axle is one rigid piece and moves together.
It's durable, but if one wheel bumps,
the whole axle will be effective.
They're extremely strong, which is why trucks use them.
They're also great for drag racing.
A torsion beam rear suspension is a little better.
The wheels are offset from the axle,
so the car's weight creates torsion,
which compresses these springs allowing for a smoother ride.
A MacPherson strut assembly looks like this.
It's basically a spring for damping an individual wheel.
Double wishbone suspensions are a little more sophisticated
than the straight strut designs
and they result in better handling,
thanks to these two lateral control arms
that look like the cape wishbone wears
when he's dressed as Sherlock Holmes,
hence double wishbone.
Multilingual suspensions look like this:
a complicated mess of links to push and pull on the wheel
in every which way.
This design is super customizable,
as these links can be replaced with adjustable pieces
to tune your suspension exactly how you want it.
Camber is the angle made by the wheels,
sitting on the ground, measured in degrees of swag.
Wheels straight up and down have zero camber,
and thus no swag.
These wheels have like 20 degrees of negative swag
and these wheels have 90 degrees of positive swag,
which mathematically is swag to the max.
Camber angle has a direct effect
on how much grip your tires have.
So if you want to really grippy set up,
you're not gonna want a (beep) ton of camber in your tires.
Whereas, if you'd want to look cool as hell,
you're definitely gonna want all that camber.
Me personally, I'm a grippy boy. I like grip.
So I don't want to have a lot of camber,
but I can appreciate a good camber set up when I see one.
(chuckles) Yes!
Double clutching is when you match the engine speed
with the speed of the gear you want to shift into.
You put the clutch in shift to neutral, let the clutch out,
give the engine some gas to get the RPMs up,
put the clutch back in,
shifted the next gear and let the clutch out.
AFR is the air fuel ratio.
Basically, the mix of air and gasoline your car uses to run.
If you're using more gas and not enough air,
you're running rich, which results in bad gas mileage.
And if you're not using enough gas,
you're running lean,
and you might notice bad or jerky acceleration.
And it's usually pretty bad for your engine.
When you strike the perfect air fuel ratio,
it's like Goldilocks using baby bear's toilet.
It just feels so right.
Hey man, he's got up a day, can't blame her.
Let's talk about the different types
of horsepower ratings you might've seen.
Brake horsepower, wheel horsepower, to the crank,
what does all that mean?
Brake horsepower, or BHP, is the amount of power
actually delivered at the crank shaft,
which is why some people say to the crank.
Brake horsepower is different from wheel horsepower,
or how much power actually makes it to the ground.
A notable amount of power is lost,
when going from the engine through the drive train
into the wheels.
You've probably heard of limp mode,
which is a safe mode for your car.
If any number of sensors goes off,
limp mode kicks in, which usually limits your engine
to around 2,000 RPM and keeps your ride from hurting itself.
If your car goes into limp mode,
you'd kind of have no choice,
but to walk of shame it to a mechanic,
so they can identify which sensor went off and why.
Here's some manual transmission terms.
Heel-toe is a tricky and very cool method of downshifting
with a manual transmission.
In the middle of a downshift,
you brake and hit the throttle at the same time,
using your heel and your toe.
Try this one in your buddy's car before you break yours.
Rev matching is when you blip the gas
to match the RPM difference between the engine
and the transmission during a shift.
You can actually do this without a clutch.
if you do it smoothly enough, I can not.
Rev hang is when you push in the clutch and the RPMs stay up
and decrease gradually.
Car manufacturers program it into the engine control module
to keep your car from creating too many harmful missions
that are product of quick gear changes.
I know that sounds crazy, but trust me, it's real.
Car throttle has a good article on it,
I'll leave a link in the description.
A money shift is when you're driving super hard
and you accidentally shipped into the wrong gear.
More specifically on money shift to shifting one, two,
and then back to one hitting first gear again after second
instead of hitting third,
shooting your RPMs into the stratosphere
and likely causing a lot of money's worth of damage.
Final drive is the ratio between the pinion
and ring gear in the differential and exists in every car.
A lower final drive ratio will result in less torque,
but a higher top speed while a higher ratio
will do the opposite.
LSD stands for limited slip differential.
It's a kind of rear differential that drives both wheels,
even if one of them loses traction.
It results in a smoother power transfer to the wheels
and makes it possible
to do big old smoky skids and burnouts.
CVT stands for continuously variable transmission,
which is belt or chain driven rather than gear driven.
The belt connects angled polies in a way that allows you
to essentially change gear ratios seamlessly.
The car doesn't need to shift gears in a traditional sense.
Cars that CVTs accelerate much smoother,
since there aren't steps in between gears.
Does it feel weird to accelerate perfectly smoothly?
Yeah, and it does.
And people don't really like it, but it is pretty cool.
Blinker fluid is a lubricating agent
that helps silence that annoying click in your turn signals.
If you hear that tick tock sound,
you're probably not taking good enough care of your car,
take it to the shop immediately.
Or if you fancy yourself a real grease monkey,
you can change your blinker fluid yourself.
I recommend Dirty Dirk's blinker drink.
It's made from real snake oil
and we're proud to have them as a sponsor.
A transaxle is one big box that combines the transmission
axle and differential into one single unit.
They were invented to save serious space
for FF and RR vehicles.
They're also used in some FR vehicles
for weight distribution.
Racing from a dig means starting a race from a dead stop,
also known as racing.
Racing from a roll means starting a race
while the cars are already moving.
A shout out to 1320 video. I freaking love you guys.
Check out their channel for some roll racing examples.
Ground effect is an aerodynamic principle
of race car design.
You shape the car so that when you drive differences in air
pressure create a downward force on your car,
giving you better traction.
Firing order is the order in which the spark plugs and fire.
For example, in this six cylinder engine,
the firing order is one five, three six two four.
The firing orders are usually optimized for balance
between the left and right cylinder banks,
as well as the front and the back of the engine.
Rod knock.
If you hear a repetitive knocking coming from your engine,
that sounds like this, might be rod knock.
Your piston is connected to a rod,
which is then connected to your crank shaft.
There are bearings at each end,
and if you run too low on oil
or just go to ham on your engine,
you can damage that rod bearing,
which means metal on metal contact.
Your engine might be toast.
So rest in peace.
There it is a bunch of car terms you need to know.
How many did you know already?
Let me know in the comments.
Now you know all of them.
So feel free to ask your mechanic
for Dirty Dirk's blinker drink with competence.
Obviously, I missed a ton of them.
We're probably going to do more of these episodes
in the future, so if there's something
you'd like to hear more about,
let me know in the comments below.
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